The first commercially successful electronic cigarette
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 3 April 2026
⏱️ 11 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In the summer of 2003, pharmacist Hon Lik was one of millions of smokers in China.
He was coughing a lot and having problems with his breathing and wondered if he could make an alternative cigarette.
After various experiments, he created a vape prototype. It went on sale in May 2004 and was instantly a hit - selling 100,000 in China.
Hon tells Megan Jones how he brought it to market.
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(Photo: Hon Lik smokes his invention. Credit: Frederic J Brown/AFP via Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, music, radio podcasts. |
| 0:07.3 | Their company's success helped build a nation. |
| 0:10.9 | The company is such a big part of Korea's economy. |
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| 0:17.2 | They often say, look, we built the nation. |
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| 0:43.2 | Hello and welcome to witness history with me, Megan Jones. If you're already one of our regular listeners, you know the drill. You can jump ahead of it. But if you're new here, |
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| 1:02.3 | But now, let's get to the programme. |
| 1:05.8 | Around 1 billion people use tobacco products around the world. |
| 1:10.0 | But in the early 2000s, a Chinese pharmacist started wondering |
| 1:14.8 | whether there was a less harmful alternative to smoking. |
| 1:18.6 | This is the story of how what's believed to be |
| 1:21.0 | the first commercially successful electronic cigarettes or the vape was created. |
| 1:26.3 | Across China, smokers now get through 1,800 billion cigarettes a year, a 20-fold |
| 1:32.5 | increase in just one generation, which has meant China has now taken over from the United |
| 1:37.4 | States in having the highest number of deaths from smoking in the world. |
| 1:41.7 | Among those millions of smokers is pharmacist Horn Lick, |
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